Although the management of asthma has greatly improved within the past 50 years, the prevalence has steadily been increasing. Between the years 2001 to 2009 the number of people diagnosed with asthma grew by 4.3 million. In fact, 1 in 12 people in the U.S. now suffer from asthma and the populations most effected are children, females, and minorities.
The table below shows asthma prevalence, by selected demographic characteristics in the United States, averaged for the years 2008 to 2010.
.
The Center for Disease Control and Prevention gives the most recent data (from 2012) for mortality and morbidity from asthma. Morbidity refers to the rate at which asthma occurs in a group of people and is broken down into rates for adults and rates for children. For adults the number of non-institutionalized adults who currently have asthma is 18.7 million, or 8.0% of the population. The number of children who currently have asthma is 6.8 million, or 9.3%. The mortality rate refers to how many people have died from asthma and in 2011 the number of deaths were 3,345, or 1.1 out of 100,000. These numbers lead to questions of why. Why is the incidence greater in children? Why do the number of people with asthma continue to increase? Why do we not know the cause, or ways to prevent someone from getting asthma? Why is there not a cure? For a disease so common and well known, the underlying questions cannot currently be answered. But the question we can answer is: how do we manage the symptoms of asthma in a cost-effective way?
Asthma in the US. (2011, May 3). Retrieved January 17, 2015, from http://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns/Asthma/?s_cid=vitalsigns_065
Trends in Asthma Prevalence, Health Care Use, and Mortality in the United States, 2001–2010. (2012, May 1). Retrieved January 17, 2015, from http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/databriefs/db94.htm#x2013;2010
Asthma. (2014, July 14). Retrieved January 17, 2015, from http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/asthma.htm
Yong, Y., & Shafie, A. (n.d.). Economic evaluation of enhanced asthma management: A systematic review. Retrieved January 17, 2015, from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4282768/
The table below shows asthma prevalence, by selected demographic characteristics in the United States, averaged for the years 2008 to 2010.
.
The Center for Disease Control and Prevention gives the most recent data (from 2012) for mortality and morbidity from asthma. Morbidity refers to the rate at which asthma occurs in a group of people and is broken down into rates for adults and rates for children. For adults the number of non-institutionalized adults who currently have asthma is 18.7 million, or 8.0% of the population. The number of children who currently have asthma is 6.8 million, or 9.3%. The mortality rate refers to how many people have died from asthma and in 2011 the number of deaths were 3,345, or 1.1 out of 100,000. These numbers lead to questions of why. Why is the incidence greater in children? Why do the number of people with asthma continue to increase? Why do we not know the cause, or ways to prevent someone from getting asthma? Why is there not a cure? For a disease so common and well known, the underlying questions cannot currently be answered. But the question we can answer is: how do we manage the symptoms of asthma in a cost-effective way?
Now, as with most things, the discussion of asthma prevalence leads to another question, the big cha-ching question: how much is this costing? If we look at the statistics for asthma related visits to the ER (1.8 million in 2010) and hospital stays with asthma as the primary diagnosis (439,000 with an average stay of 3.6 days) we can see how important education and access to management of the disease is. Not only does living with uncontrolled asthma lead to a lower quality of life (caused by trouble breathing and constant inflammation in your body), but it ultimately costs more in the long run when people are forced to make emergency visits. In the U.S. asthma cost $56 billion in 2007 due to medical costs, lost school and work days, and early deaths. In one article they found "the most cost-effective enhanced management was a mixture of education and self-management by an integrated team of healthcare and allied healthcare professionals". Another study also found that the use of medications that decrease inflammation (inhaled corticosteroids) and reduce the risk of asthma attacks and need for hospitalization is sometimes more expensive and less easy to obtain than inhalents that offer quick symptom relief (β2 agonist). People may use the quick solution and therefore not seek out further help from a health care team, leading to poorly managed asthma and increased risk for big ticket items (both financially and health wise)- such as asthma attacks, ER visits, or even death.
So, the take away message remains: the importance of well managed asthma cannot be overlooked and is critical for quality of life and quality of bank accounts.
Asthma in the US. (2011, May 3). Retrieved January 17, 2015, from http://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns/Asthma/?s_cid=vitalsigns_065
Trends in Asthma Prevalence, Health Care Use, and Mortality in the United States, 2001–2010. (2012, May 1). Retrieved January 17, 2015, from http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/databriefs/db94.htm#x2013;2010
Asthma. (2014, July 14). Retrieved January 17, 2015, from http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/asthma.htm
Yong, Y., & Shafie, A. (n.d.). Economic evaluation of enhanced asthma management: A systematic review. Retrieved January 17, 2015, from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4282768/
Chiang, Aït-Khaled, Bissell, & Enarson. (n.d.). Management of asthma in resource-limited settings: Role of low-cost corticosteroid/β-agonist combination inhaler. Retrieved January 17, 2015, from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25574908
No comments:
Post a Comment